Eluding Fate
by Tenukii
Summary: The boys' salvation from hanging, from Pete's point of view.


"Where's the happy little tire swing?"

Leave it to Delmar to ask. Pete saw no signs of a tire swing, happy or otherwise. No, the only things swinging from the mighty oak tree were three ropes with loops at the end. . . and those loops sure weren't tires. The three men digging graves nearby made the whole scene look even more out of place.

Footsteps scuffling in the dirt behind the four friends made Pete turn to see two of the sheriff's men with rifles, but the voice of the sheriff made him face forward again.

"End of the road, boys." The sheriff was coming out of Everett's ancestral manse, leading his bloodhound. Could have been the very devil himself, just the way Tommy had seen him, right down to the mean ol' hound- although at the moment, Pete was a lot less worried about what the dog could do to him than he was what Sheriff Cooley and his men could do. It hadn't been any slobbery bloodhound laid the welts on him that still burned under his shirt. No, all the hound had done was snuffle and bay his way along their trail. _And it weren't,_ Pete thought with a sick feeling of guilt, _the hound that told 'em we was headed to this very valley. . . ._

"It's had its twists and turns, and now it deposits you here," the sheriff went on as his men began to herd Everett and the boys forward. One gave Delmar and Pete a shove, and Pete's hand brushed Delmar's side. Pete felt Delmar's shorter fingers close over his immediately: either poor Delmar was scared out of what little wits he had, or else from his usual kind-hearted nature, he was trying to reassure Pete. Maybe both. Pete folded his fingers around his friend's and held on tight.

"Wait a minute!" Everett protested in Cooley's directions, but for once, he wasn't the one spewing words. The sheriff would not be interrupted.

"You have eluded fate, and you have eluded me for the last time. Tie their hands, boys."

"You can't do this, now!" Everett started. Pete stared in blank amazement as the sheriff's men grabbed for Everett's arms, held them behind his back, and looped rope over them. Delmar, in turn, stared at Pete, as if Pete could somehow fix things where Everett had failed.

"Didn't know you'd be bringing a friend," Cooley continued. "He'll just have to wait his turn, share one of your graves." As he spoke, one of the men shoved Pete away from Delmar, pulling their hands apart, and began to tie the shorter man's arms as well. Pete's amazement turned back into heavy guilt; it was easy enough to put some of the blame on Everett (wasn't it always?), but Delmar was an innocent who'd never hurt anybody (unless you counted the Piggly Wiggly).

"You can't _do_ this!" Everett bellowed. "We just got pardoned by the governor hisself!"

"It went out on the radio," put in Delmar.

"Is that right?" The bloodhound punctuated Cooley's words with a raise of his wrinkled brows. "Well, we ain't got a radio."

Delmar's mouth fell open at this piece of news, but Pete's was hanging open too. "God have mercy," he breathed as it all sank in: it didn't matter to Sheriff/Devil Cooley that the three were pardoned, or that Tommy hadn't done anything wrong in the first place. The sheriff was as single-minded as the bloodhound: the hound's duty was to hunt, and Cooley's was to kill.

Off to the side, the trio of gravediggers had finished their work. Climbing out of the graves and standing beside three rough coffins, they began to sing a spiritual, their deep voices blending together. It was a funeral dirge.

"It ain't fittin'," Tommy said.

"It ain't the _law_." But the sheriff only scoffed at Everett's charge.

"The _law_?" He raised his blank, reflective gaze to the skies. "The law is a human institution."

_He __**is**__ the devil,_Pete thought. _Tommy was right all along._

The soulless glasses turned back to the prisoners. "Perhaps you should start making your prayers." The sheriff's man pulled off Everett's hat, then Delmar's. As Pete felt his being snatched away, he let his eyes fall closed. _Oh God, forgive me._ He couldn't think of anything else to pray, so he opened his eyes again.

"Oh my God. Everett?" Not that he had much hope Everett could talk their way out of this one. . . but expecting Everett to have a plan had kind of become a habit. Everett didn't answer though; it was Delmar who spoke.

"Tommy? I'm sorry we got you into this." Tommy nodded and lowered his head, but Pete was struck- not for the first time- by just how selfless Delmar could be. Pete had to try again, for Delmar's sake if nothing else. . . and if Everett didn't have a plan, it was time to appeal to a higher authority.

"Good Lord. . . what do we do?"

The Lord didn't answer, unless He was speaking through the voices of the gravediggers singing their spiritual. But then Everett finally acted: he dropped to his knees and began to pray.

Normally Pete would have been stunned, but it somehow seemed fitting to hear Everett's silver tongue now asking simply for a chance to see his family again. Delmar started to cry, which nigh broke Pete's heart, but he kept his eyes turned upward and mouthed his own prayer again. _Lord, please forgive me. . . ._

And then Delmar's soft whimpers ceased. Pete realized why an instant later: they had both heard something. It was the sound of water in a valley with no stream or even a pond.

The bloodhound looked down at a trickle of water now running along the ground, then he picked up one of his large paws in complaint. Everett looked down too as the water soaked into the knees of his overalls, and he got to his feet in bemusement. The three men stared in the direction of the noise they all heard, up past Everett's old cabin. Finally even the devil turned and looked over his shoulder, just in time to see a wall of water crashing towards them. It hit the back of the ancestral manse and exploded it, then loomed over the prisoners.

_Is drownin' better than hangin'?_ Pete had time to wonder before the flood crashed down upon them.

* * *

The whole world had turned blue. It had a dreamy look to it, and suddenly Pete realized why some people did themselves in by drowning.

_Not me, though, no sir!_ Pete thought. _I ain't givin' up now- not when the Lord's given me one more chance!_ He twisted his narrow wrists in the ropes binding them- his wrists moved freely enough, but his broad hands were another story. Finally, by folding his thumbs and pinkies under his palms, Pete worked first the left hand out, then the right.

By that time, the air he held in his lungs was burning. He managed to catch the bottom of the newborn lake with one foot, then he pushed off with all the strength he hand, kicking his long legs as he headed for the surface. He had to let the air out in a veil of bubbles halfway up, and his goal began to seem like it was receding instead of getting closer.

_Keep goin',_ he told himself, as sternly as he could manage despite the black dots that were now dancing before his eyes. _It's God's sign that He's forgiven me. . . ._ Slowly the lighter blue water above drew nearer, but it still seemed impossible to reach. Pete faltered, then he thought of something else: Delmar's smaller hand clutching his. . . Delmar reaching for _him_, not Everett. And it hadn't been the first time.

_Delmar don't have no one else to take care of him now that Everett's got his family. He needs me._ Pete gave one last kick of his legs and shot upward, breaking the surface of water in a flailing of arms and a gasping for air that sliced into his lungs when he caught it.

Once he could breathe again, Pete shook his head like a dog, trying to knock the water out of his ears, eyes, and nose. Delmar had surfaced right in front of him, and he grabbed for Pete's shoulder; they managed to steady themselves on each other's arms, panting.

A moment later, something else shot out of the water in a cascade of spray. Pete was a little chilled to realized that it was one of the coffins, but he was pretty glad to see it all the same. He swam towards it with long strokes, leaving Delmar to paddle after him. At the same time, Everett appeared swimming from another direction. Finally, all three managed to line up along the coffin, each grasping it weakly with his arms.

"A miracle!" cried Delmar. "It was a miracle!"

"Delmar, don't be ignorant," said Everett. "I told you, they was floodin' this valley."

"No! That ain't it!"

Pete was inclined to agree with Delmar. "We prayed to God, and He pitied us!" Delmar looked at him, a slow grin spreading over his face, until Everett spoke up again.

"Well, it never fails. Once again, you two hayseeds are showin' how much you want for intellect!" The other two gave him tired looks as he went on. "There's a perfectly scientific explanation for what just happened."

Pete couldn't stand it. "That ain't the tune you was singin' back there at the gallows!"

Everett half-raised an arm in an "I'll give you that, but you're still wrong" gesture. "Well, any human being will cast about in a moment of stress. No, the fact is, they're floodin' this valley so they can hydroelectric up the whole durn state. Yes sir, the South is gonna change."

Pete had been looking around and half-tuning Everett out, trying to save his energy for hanging on to the coffin instead of wasting it on Everett. At that statement, though, he turned to look at Delmar. Delmar was looking back at him, and the look in those simple, warm eyes clearly said, "He's full of it."

_South ain't never gonna change,_ Pete agreed with him. _Least I hope not, if change means more Everetts and fewer Delmars._

"Everything's gonna be put on electricity," Everett went on, "and put on a payin' basis. Out with the old spiritual mumbo jumbo, the superstitions, and the backward ways. We're gonna see a brave new world where they run everybody a wire and hook us all up to a grid. Yes sir, a veritable age of reason. . . like the one they had in France! Not a moment too soon."

Finally, mercifully, Everett trailed off. He was staring at what Pete and Delmar had noticed a moment ago: a large brown cow with a strangely heart-shaped white spot on her side. She was standing at ease on a cotton house's tin roof, daintily avoiding the water that had nearly reached the roof's edge.

"Not a moment too soon," Everett murmured. Soon his attention drifted, though. "Hey, there's Tommy! Tommy, what you ridin' there?"

Tommy was fumbling with an unwieldy piece of furniture, and he didn't answer until he had a good grip on it. "Roll-top desk!"

_A' course it is._ Pete shook his head in good-natured disbelief. Everything always ended up right for Ulysses Everett McGill.

"Come on, boys!" Everett called. "Start headin' for Tommy, then we all set out for dry land!" Pete didn't bother challenging Everett's authority this time. It was as good a plan as any.

As the three started kicking and steering the coffin towards Tommy and his desk, Pete glanced down at Delmar to his left, floating along between him and Everett. Delmar looked up at him curiously.

"You okay, Pete? You didn't swaller too much water, didja?"

"Nah. I'm okay." Pete took his left arm off the coffin and draped it over Delmar's shoulders. Then something caught his eye off in the distance, way past Everett. Pete squinted at it, then it came into focus: a massive canine head, wrinkly and very wet, held just above water as its owner dog-paddled towards dry land of his own.

_Looks like the devil got his due. . . and his hound's off to better things._ Pete had to chuckle at that as he looked back at Delmar.

The smaller man was staring up at him in bewilderment. "You _sure_ yer all right, Pete?"

Pete squeezed his shoulders and nodded. "Yeah."

"Okay." Delmar's confusion melted to a smile, and he leaned into Pete's side a minute. Then Pete put his arm back on the coffin for a better grip, and the four fugitives struck out for dry land together.

* * *

The End


End file.
